The Ties That Bind
by whitchry9
Summary: In a world where everyone is linked to those close to them with coloured bonds, only a select few can see them. John Watson happens to be one of those people, except no one else knows. Four parter.
1. Chapter 1

There were only some people, a special few, although how that was determined was unknown, who saw the links between people. It was generally accepted that they were there, between everyone, linking brothers, sisters, parents, lovers.

But there was only a small portion of the population who could see these links, understand what they meant, and perhaps even change them. (The idea that links could be altered by those who saw them was highly disputed.)

* * *

These few people were the ones that could feel their bonds being altered. They would know when someone close to them died. They could feel the pain of that tie being severed. No one else could, even though it did happen. The theory was 'out of sight, out of mind'. Oddly enough though, the pain wasn't felt by everyone who saw them. Scientists explained this away by saying that people who didn't feel the pain were only claiming to see them.

John had a different theory. That it depended on the bond. The type, the colour, the thickness, the length, how long it had been between two people.

He never told anyone this, because he'd never told anyone that he could see them.

He wanted one thing in his life to himself, one secret.

* * *

John watched a man die in Afghanistan, watched as all his ties were cut, and he mourned for his wife back home in London. She could see the ties, and he knew that at that moment, she was watching her red tie unravel. With no other end for it to cling to, it would blow about in the wind. John knew that she would know exactly what happened. John knew that she would go and scoop up their baby girl, little Avery, only six months old, and sob as one of the few ties she had was severed.

John also lost a silver tie that day. Silver was for doctor patient relationships. Incredibly useful, but extremely painful. John knew some doctors who could see them, and they found that after a while, they couldn't work any more. The pain of having that connection cut became unbearable.

John tolerated the pain well. It was a reminder of what he lost. No human life should pass from the world without someone feeling pain.

John knew it was somewhat illogical, but he felt like he should be that person. The bearer of hardships, the feeler of deaths.


	2. Chapter 2

There were many books written on the strands, and what they mean. Long descriptions of colours, diagrams for examples, and instructions on how to see them filled most books. The only problem with this was that people who couldn't see them could not learn how to see them. It was as simple as that. You were born with it or you weren't.

Quite a few scientists who could see them had gotten together and written a fantastic books that was essentially the bible of links.

All the people John knew who saw them had a copy, pages dog eared and notes written in margins, bits highlighted for later reference.

John didn't have one of these books, but every time he saw one he soaked the information up, starved for insight into himself.

He memorized all the known colours of links, could run them off at a moment's notice if required. His friends thought it was a neat party trick for someone who couldn't see them. He just shrugged and told them it was easy, the colour matched the relationships.

Red for love. Blue for paternal. Pink for maternal. Green for siblings. Orange for other family members. Purple for friendship. Yellow for coworkers and colleagues. Black for enemies. Silver for professional relationships, often between doctors and patients or teachers and students.

Those were all the known colours of all the known links. Of course, they varied depending on the people and the nature of the relationship, dark blood red or almost orange meant very different things between lovers, but it was generally accepted that these were the only colours that existed.

* * *

John met Mike Stamford in the park that day, a sunshine bond between them that quickly returned to the purple shade it had once been, before John had gone to Afghanistan, back when they were in school together.

He introduced him to a man surrounded by a web of yellow, a solitary strand each of blue, pink, and green amidst sunshine streamers and the occasional silver flash.

John felt sad for him. No friends. No love.

Another yellow strand reached out to John and grabbed him firmly, tying a knot that John hadn't seen the likes of often.

* * *

The next day when he went to see the flat, John saw who the pink bond led to. The landlady, Mrs Hudson. She obviously wasn't Sherlock's mother, but must have been the single maternal figure still in his life. Mrs Hudson reached out to John with an orange string. He didn't really want to ponder what that meant. But she was obviously fond of Sherlock. John didn't need to see a pink bond to know that.

* * *

Sherlock was thrilled when another man showed up to invite him to help at a crime scene. This Lestrade was linked to Sherlock with a dark blue strand. John just went with it. After the couple of days he'd had, not much more could surprise him. Of course, he was wrong.


	3. Chapter 3

At the crime scene, John watched as dark yellow strands led to the woman who greeted Sherlock by calling him 'Freak' and the man who insisted he didn't want his crime scene contaminated.

But mostly, he was fascinated by the silver strand that Sherlock threw out to the dead woman, one that danced around her, touching every part of her before returning to Sherlock. John had never heard of anything like that before. He stored it away, making a note to research it later, somewhere Sherlock couldn't find out about it.

Sherlock ran off, the knot between them practically humming as it stretched. John shrugged and went off to find a cab that was not destined to be, instead getting picked up by a dark car and taken to some sort of warehouse. He met a man who was tangled in a web of connections. He tried not to watch as a clear strand reached between them and tried to decide what colour to take. It flickered between black, silver, and yellow. It was still churning as John left, utterly confused about who the man was. He claimed he was Sherlock's enemy, which John did not believe. Because while John was perfectly willing to believe this man had enemies, there were knots of black ties in amongst hundreds of ones of all colours, Sherlock did not have any black ties. These two men were not linked in that way.

* * *

It was only after that cabbie incident, the one where Sherlock developed the strand he'd never seen before, after John shot him and their bond grew brighter, did John see the man again in relation to Sherlock. Green. Faint, definitely, but there. _Brothers. _The strand between Mycroft and John took on a brown colour, like it couldn't decide what it was at that moment, so it kept trying to be everything.

* * *

John had long since known that family ties were not always cut and dry. Sometimes biological parents had no connections to their children. Connections were not made by blood, but rather, love.

John had seen the pink link between himself and his mother before she died, between her and Harry.

Pink really didn't suit Harry though. Harry was always more of a red and black girl, often the same link would switch between the two colours, overly dramatically.

* * *

Mycroft still had his pink strand, probably connecting to Mummy Holmes somewhere, but Sherlock's only pink link was to Mrs Hudson. John wondered what this meant (You know how it always upset Mummy...) but sure wasn't going to ask Sherlock about his relationship with his mother, as Sherlock would somehow see through it. John did not want to have to explain this to Sherlock.

* * *

Sherlock finally acquired a black strand one night in a pool. John stepped out and saw the shiver in the purple line between them, a slight darkening as Sherlock doubted their relationship. But when Sherlock realized John was only a pawn, that he was being controlled by the real Moriarty, a black strand grew out of him and skulked around, looking for its other half.

And when Moriarty finally stepped out, the strand shot over to him and tried to strangle him. Or it looked that way. The man already had numerous black ones and a single red one that didn't have far to go, because John could see the knot. _One of the shooters... _his heart sank. _Love is a much more vicious motivator... _John knew this couldn't go well.

But they made it out, even though the bond between them was slightly darker for the next couple of days, as though Sherlock couldn't quite shake that feeling of disbelief.

* * *

When it came to the woman... that was an interesting one. Sherlock and Irene were linked by a rough strand, barely gripping on to each other. Irene's end was pink and Sherlock's end was silver, meeting in the middle at the knot.

John knew that meant Irene had feelings for Sherlock, but Sherlock didn't have feelings for her. It was a conundrum, especially considering it rather seemed to be that they were both dancing around each other.

In the end, Sherlock's strand tinged pink, and was a rather odd looking one amidst all his other shades. After Mycroft told him she was dead, he wondered what that meant for the strand.

Or what it meant for her.


	4. Chapter 4

Sherlock and John were out for lunch one day, a rare time between cases where Sherlock actually felt like eating. He was testing John's deduction skills. He'd just failed miserably on a man sitting across the street waiting for a bus. John thought the girl sitting next to him was his girlfriend, whereas Sherlock rolled his eyes and told John the man was obviously gay.

"That couple... there," Sherlock said, pointing out two people holding hands, walking down the street. "Do them."

"Newlyweds," John said immediately, recognizing the dusky rose shade that linked them.

"Yes." Sherlock actually sounded surprised. "How did you know?" Sherlock glanced at him suspiciously.

_Oh crap. _John swallowed his mouthful of coffee. "Look at them," he said, like it was entirely obvious.

Sherlock looked again. "Of course, look at the way they're holding hands, not to mention..."

Sherlock continued for a while longer, but John wasn't listening. _Close call, _he told himself. _You're going to have to be more careful or he will notice something. That's what he does. _

* * *

"I don't have friends."

But that was entirely untrue, because John could see the purple link connecting them, knew that there was an almost purple bluish link from Lestrade. But Sherlock was in A Mood, and besides, John could never tell him that. Could never tell him that he was One of Them, that he could see them, because Sherlock would insist on experiments and using John for many things. He wouldn't be able to take that.

Some things were meant to be kept private.

So John just replied sarcastically and went off to bed.

Sherlock corrected his statement in the morning. John smiled on the inside and the knot pulled tighter, as if afraid one of them might let go.

* * *

Ties didn't disappear in the blink of an eye, as soon as a heart stopped beating. They faded slowly, never on a specific schedule, but they snapped free and faded.

They let go and gave up.

* * *

When Sherlock fell through the air, the line streaming down through the sky like one part of a rainbow, John knew what would happen. He was a doctor. How could he not?

He'd never lost a purple strand before. He didn't know what to expect.

It hurt, just like he knew it would. It was hard to tell whether it was his link or his heart that was screaming.

* * *

The magenta violet strand never left John. He'd heard stories about people that couldn't let go, that lost the other end of their tie but couldn't believe it, that held on so strongly the tie still existed with no other end, just flapped about in the breeze somewhere far away, but he couldn't believe that.

He wasn't one of those people. He still had hope that one day, he would see the knot coming back into view and the other end of his tie would appear.

He had to hope. It was all he had.


End file.
